For a business to grow, be it a small family business or a big multinational firm, it needs to generate interest, draw in leads and convert these leads into customers.

To do so, it needs to track these leads, manage the sales funnel, and work on them in order to ensure maximum conversions.

For companies that have a huge number of leads to track, doing all this can feel slightly overwhelming. That’s where the lead management process comes in.

What is Lead Management?

Lead Management is the process by which businesses track and optimize the entire sales process. This process is also referred to as customer acquisition management or contact management in certain cases.

It usually encompasses a few processes, namely, Lead generation, leads scoring, leads filtration and distribution, follows up, and lead nurturing.

1. Lead Generation

Lead Gen is basically the initiation of the consumer interest or inquiry into the products or services of a business through a range of marketing tactics like social media, events, PR campaigns, etc.

These leads can be created for purposes like sales leads, list building, e-newsletter list acquisition, etc. You can generate leads using lead magnets, email marketing, offering up free demos, etc.

2. Lead Scoring

Lead Scoring is a methodology that is used to rank the prospects against a scale that is a representation of the perceived value that each of the leads represents to the organization.  

The results of the scoring are used to determine which leads will engage in the order of priority.  While doing this process, both implicit and explicit data are included.  The implicit data is derived from monitoring the prospect's behavior while the explicit data is provided by or is about the prospect.

3. Filtration and Distribution

After collecting the data,  these leads are segregated based on the validity of the request,  priority is based on the likeliness of translating into a customer, and then these are distributed to the sales representatives to be contacted for further follow-up.

Depending upon the size of the organization and the marketing program, a lot of effort can go into defining how to accurately segregate and sort these leads.

4. Lead Nurturing

Lead Nurturing is the process of developing and reinforcing the relationships with the buyer at every stage of the sales funnel.

A fine and successful lead nurturing program focuses its marketing and communication efforts on listening to the pains of prospects and providing them the information and answers that would help them build trust, increase brand awareness, and maintain a connection until and after the prospects are ready to make a purchase.

The main thing that the lead management software does is to enable the forecasting, collection and tracking of the sales leads.

1. HubSpot CRM

Hubspot CRM- It is a lead management solution that works really well for both marketers and salespeople. It keeps a track of all the leads in one centralized and customizable database while helping you manage the sales part of the pipeline so that the deals don't break midway.

HubSpot CRM  helps you avoid all of that digging through the inbox just to get the info about one lead. It is easy to set up and intuitive to use and also comes in with the free-to-use version.

2. FreshSales CRM

Freshsales-CRM is a sales CRM and lead management software by Freshworks that works well for all sizes of businesses to attract, manage, close and nurture leads.

It comes within a highly intuitive user interface, AI-based lead scoring, visual deal pipeline,  workflow automation,  customizable visual reports, and dashboards. This software gives a business everything that it needs to manage its sales without having to juggle through multiple tools and tabs.

3. Bitrix24

Bitrix24 is a free lead management system that is used by over 4,000,000 companies that offer lead capture qualification scoring and sales automation tools.

It is a full-featured CRM system whose editions are available on cloud mobile and open-source on-premises. This software is available in English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Russian, and many other languages.

4. SendX

SendX is an email marketing software that helps you with email campaigns, drip marketing, list growth, landing pages, webforms, automation, etc.

It has one of the simplest UIs in the industry and also provides unlimited email sends with every plan,  automation capabilities,  24/7 live support, etc.  More than 3000 companies across the world trust this software for their email marketing.

The pricing for the same starts at around $9.99 per month.

5. Zoho - CRM

Zoho CRM empowers the global network of over 1,50,000 businesses and almost 180 countries and facilitates them to convert more leads, engage with more customers and grow revenue by allowing you to import and add leads to accounts,  track the competition and analyze the data and speed up the conversion rates.

While it is a very simple straightforward user interface with a minimal learning curve,  it is flexible and supports month-to-month contracts with transparent pricing plans.

It is a fully extensible developer platform that facilitates tighter integration of CRM with external systems and applications and also, it has CRM apps for both iOS and Android.

6. Team365

Team 365 is a customer relationship management software that is basically built for companies that are not willing to spend much time logging data. It keeps all your contacts and other information in one centralized and customizable database and manages your sales pipeline so that the deals are kept moving forward.  

It basically has all the information about a lead in one place and is very easy to set up and intuitive to use.  It also has a free version that you can start using at any time to grow your business.

7. Salesmate

Salesmate helps businesses close deals much faster than any other software. It's an easy-to-use interface and automated workflows allow the sales teams to focus on the right deals at the right time.

Some of its finest features include email drip sequences, built-in Calling with Power Dialer, and workflow automation. You can use Salesmate software on your laptop iOS or Android devices and also inside your Gmail inbox and nurture your leads well.

Conclusion

Now that you’ve got a complete understanding of what lead management is and what are some of the best lead management CRM software that is available, it's time for you to choose the right one for your business and nurture your leads and brand well.